Heads or Tails
by vanillafluffy
Summary: When Dean is assaulted by a demon during a hunt, Sam saves his life, but the drama is just beginning. Mpreg, mentions of Wincest, and some really disgusting special effects.


**Heads or Tails**

They have blueprints for the tunnels where the demon has been holing up, two tunnels that merge into a bigger room where they're sure its lair is, and it comes down to a coin toss for who takes which tunnel. Dean calls "Heads!" and smirks. Neither of them knows it, but Dean won't be smirking again for a long time.

Sam makes it to the lair first and torches it. When he hears screaming, he bolts down the other corridor. As he races toward the sound, he sees a monstrous figure looming over a prone one. He's sure the damned thing is killing his brother. Dean never screams; he's been shot, clawed, nearly electrocuted and barely grimaced, but this creature rings hoarse cries from Dean as it---

Violates him.

When the holy water hits it, it lets out an enraged roar. It found a human host, but its humanity is long gone. As it rises from his brother and lunges toward him, growling, Sam realizes the damned thing is several inches taller than he is.

Out from under the hulking demon, Dean tries to crawl away.

The host's clothes are ragged and filthy---the holy water may be the only water that's touched its skin in a while, probably since before its been possessed. Shooting it with silver is only pissing it off, and Sam hopes grimly that Dean will be able to get away while the thing is dismembering him. He backs up, drawing the demon away from his brother. There's a sudden boom, deafening in the confined space. Its eyes go from solid black to sparking, and then it drops.

Dean has propped himself up against the tunnel wall, the Colt dangling from his hand. His eyes are glazed, but what worries Sam is his silence. There's no smirk now, no insouciant remark; Dean isn't even trying to pretend to be okay.

* * *

"No." Dean says it every time Sam says the words 'hospital' or 'doctor'. "Feds," he says, and the idea of Dean at Hendrickson's mercy, is enough to temper Sam's insistence.

Dean stands in the shower for nearly an hour. He still wears that curiously blank expression when he stumbles out of the bathroom naked and dripping, as if he's forgotten what towels are for. Sam fetches a towel and Dean flinches at its touch.

"You don't need pneumonia, Dean," Sam says, keeping his voice as calm as he can. This is so unlike Dean that he doesn't know whether to be mad or scared...but the demon is dead, so mad won't help. Then the towel comes away red and 'scared' wins. He shouldn't still be bleeding, should he? Maybe he's in shock.

He finally persuades Dean to lay down on one of the beds and let him take a look at the damage. Sam's stomach goes south when he sees the tearing. "Dean, you need stitches."

Slow headshake. "No."

Sam finds the phone book, starts looking up walk-in clinics. FBI or no FBI, he's not about to let Dean bleed to death or develop a deadly infection.

"No," says Dean again as he's dragged off the bed and bundled into sweats, but somehow, his brother doesn't think he's talking to him.

* * *

Normal, or at least their version of it, is slow in returning. At a cash-only walk-in clinic in a seedy neighborhood, the doctor on call looks at Dean's injuries and gives Sam an expression of contempt that's all too easy to read. He prescribes an antibiotic, a muscle relaxant and a stool softener, and suggests a liquid diet for the next several days.

Dean is withdrawn; he takes the meds, but doesn't respond to Sam's attempts to get him to eat. He subsists on sports drinks and jello for a week, curled up on his bed with his back to the room, and snaps at his brother's attempts to get him to communicate. He takes two or three long showers a day---it doesn't take a shrink to figure out why---and bundles up in sweat pants and Sam's shirts, which are two sizes too big on him.

Sam recalls their dad saying something once about Dean not talking after the fire, and this has to be every bit as traumatic. Maybe more---now Dean is used to being able to take care of himself, but this was a huge freaking demon, and it got the drop on him---and to have to be saved by his younger brother? Really does add insult to injury...

They're a short on cash, so Sam goes to a local day-labor place and gets a few days work doing construction while Dean heals. His heart bounces when he exits the bus in front of the motel one evening and finds Dean out in front of their unit, detailing the car.

The next morning finds them breakfasting at a diner two hundred miles away. Dean's appetite is poor, and his conversation is focused solely on discussing possible cases. The volume he plays Metallica at precludes any discussion while driving, and he's so tense Sam's afraid to push him. He's not singing along, not thumping rhythm on the steering wheel. His gaze is mostly fixed on the road ahead, occasionally flicking to the rear view mirror or the gauges.

"Dean," he says when his brother pops the tape to change it, "I'm worried about you."

This earns him a snort. Before Sam can elaborate, the sound of Master of Puppets reverberates from the speakers.

* * *

It's been two-and-a-half months since the night Dean still refuses to talk about, and Sam's starting to draw some disturbing conclusions. Although his brother's been chalking his chronic exhaustion and vomiting up to a nasty case of the flu, Sam hasn't caught it. Hasn't been sick once, and usually, if one of them gets a bug, the other one ends up with it sooner or later.

Dean bitches about the coffee everywhere they stop, and that's not like him at all. Dean would drink dishwater, if it had a few coffee grounds in it. Suddenly he's opting for toast instead of the Trucker's Special, and half the time, he doesn't even keep that down. He's usually feeling up to cherry-cheese Danish at 10 AM sharp, and everything in sight for lunch.

At first, Sam thought it was psychosomatic---hopes so, in fact---and maybe it is. The alternative is scary and just plain wrong. When he catches Dean snacking on pork rinds and marshmallow fluff with a Gatorade chaser, he decides it's time to give voice to his fears.

"We need to talk, dude," he says, dropping the drugstore bag on the bed.

True to form, Dean turns up the volume on the TV.

Sam steps in front of the screen and presses the OFF button. "I'm worried about you."

"That was the best part!"

"You've been sick an awful lot lately."

"You got me some antacids?" He spills the contents of the bag onto the green print bedspread, and for the first time in seventy-eight days, Dean sounds like himself, albeit pissed. "A pregnancy test? That's not funny, Sammy!" he snaps.

"This is me not laughing."

"That's crazy. Ridiculous. Impossible." His voice gets louder.

"Right," Sam says, putting on his own bitch-face, "because we know everything about demon physiology and how they breed."

Dean blinks. Without another word, he takes the contents of the bag and strides into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him.

* * *

"Now what am I supposed to do?" Dean demands, as if the whole thing is his fault. "Stick the Colt up my ass and pull the trigger?"

Sam hasn't heard his brother's voice sound that shrill since it changed in 11th grade. He's more than a little terrified himself, but if they both freak out, it won't help matters. "Let's start simple," he says soothingly. "An exorcism."

"I've done at least three exorcisms in the last couple months; they didn't have any effect on me."

"There's always holy water."

"I've drunk holy water. Hell, I've made coffee with holy water. That's not going to help."

"I wasn't planning on having you drink it."

* * *

"How the hell do I let you talk me into these things?"

The snark in Dean's tone is a relief. As Sam sets the paraphernalia on the sink surround, he's talked more in the last ten minutes than he has in the last couple of months. Scared and verbalizing is better than scared and silent as far as Sam's concerned.

"Because sometimes you know I'm right?" he suggests.

"Okay, just so you know, the only reason I'm letting you do this is because there may be some kind of demon assbaby in there."

"That's the only reason I'm doing it."

"It better be. Because I hear there are people who get off on this kind of stuff."

"Yeah, well, I'm not one of them."

"Good to hear it, Sammy. Having a circle jerk while we're watching porn is one thing; holy water high colonics is something else."

"Trust me, Dean. I've seen enough of your ass to last me for the rest of my life. Now, bend over with your hands in the tub."

* * *

When the holy water comes into contact with the contents of Dean's lower digestive tract, he keens low in his throat and almost inhales the washcloth he's biting down on. He straightens up, but only long enough to hang his butt over the bathtub. He's puking into the toilet and the porcelain finish on the tub will never be the same.

Dean is moaning, and Sam reaches out to rest a hand on his shoulder. Dean grips his forearm, white-knuckled, and his brother is afraid his solution may turn out to be worse than the problem. Sam watches helplessly as his brother flails and expels the evil mass with gouts of black steam.

The mirror fogs up, and Sam can hardly breathe for the stink of sulfur and shit.

"Do it again," Dean says hoarsely. "Make sure we've got all of it."

Sam's already a little queasy from the procedure; when he gets a look at the contents of the tub, he nearly adds the contents of his own stomach to the toilet.

The demon fetus has a scaly carapace; it looks like chunks of black lobster floating in ink.

The results of the second flush are a little less spectacular, but apparently no less painful. The occupant of the next room pounds on the wall, yelling, "People are trying to sleep here, you perverts!" which makes Dean laugh hysterically when he isn't retching.

* * *

Dean doesn't react at all to the fourth flush. He and Sam look at each other warily for a moment, and then Dean says, "Y'know, I could get to like that."

Sam gawps at him in horror, and is blinded by a genuine grin from his brother, the first time he's seen that expression in nearly eleven weeks. "Dude, leave my ass alone! I am totally over it. That was worse than the time I ate a quart of five-alarm chili on a bet."

For the first time since the night the demon attacked him, Dean seems like himself. He looks tired, but as they scrape up the disgusting bits of shell and flesh from the bottom of the tub so they can be salted and burned, his body language is more relaxed than it's been for months.

They're already packed---Sam had the foresight to prepare for a hasty getaway---and Dean shoulders his duffle bag easily, tossing the car keys in the air and catching them with a flourish. He smiles lovingly at the Impala and caresses the glossy enamel.

As he slams the trunk lid shut, the door to the unit beside theirs opens, and an elderly couple exits, lugging suitcases. The old man merely glares at them, but his wife is more blunt.

"You people should be ashamed of yourselves!" she spits. "Carrying on with all that loud, kinky sex while decent people are trying to sleep. That's unnatural!"

"Lady, you have no idea," says Dean. And smirks.


End file.
